79

A solid standalone expansion, but with some flaws

Fallen Champions is a fun, if flawed, strategy game in the style of the Total War series. It plays somewhat like an expansion to King Arthur 1 and a preview to King Arthur 2, and if you're familiar with those games, you'll be at home with this one, too. You're given armies, heroes, and missions to complete, and then you get to battle it out in a Total War-style real-time battle. Like in the first King Arthur game, these battles are fun to play, and they're unique in their use of hero units and magic, which can quickly turn the tide of battle. These battles are tied together by a plot in the form of a choose-your-own adventure text story based in the lore of King Arthur. I love this blend of old-school adventure with new-school RTS, but it worked better in King Arthur 1 than in this standalone expansion. In this game, there simply isn't as much to do when it comes to managing your kingdom, and the choices you're given lead to a more linear game. In King Arthur 1, you could pretty much do whatever you wanted to... in this game, you're stuck playing a defined story, with some limited choices presented with the text-based adventure system. It's still fun to play, but it seems like a step backward from the first game, and its replayability suffers.
Overall, though, this is a nice little standalone expansion. The game looks and sounds fantastic, and I haven't encountered any serious bugs. As long as you approach it as a game with limited scope (i.e. not the epic possibilities of the first title in the series), you should enjoy it.